Topic: NewsBusters
Warner Todd Huston has emerged as NewsBusters' chief defender of Fred Thompson (as we've noted). He does so again in a Sept. 10 post bashing the media's coverage of Thompson's reference to an "al Qaeda enforced smoking ban in Iraq" without investigating "what Thompson meant, or could have meant." Huston insisted that it was "just another attempt to destroy Thompson. ... Even Ron Paul is treated with more respect by the media."
Of course, Huston didn't give the same deference to John Kerry when he similarly mangled a statement. After Kerry said that if you don't successfully navigate the educational system, "you get stuck in Iraq" -- meant as criticism of President Bush that he later described as a "botched joke" -- Huston immediately declared: "Obviously, Kerry feels that all our soldiers are uneducated louts with no other opportunities." No effort made to find out "what he meant, or could have meant."
Double standard, anyone? Huston has a lot of them where Thompson is concerned. We've previously noted how Huston refused to ascribed a Thompson campaign official's reportedly anti-Israel views to Thompson himself, though his NewsBusters colleagues couldn't hang controversial statements made by bloggers hired by John Edwards' campaign around Edwards' neck fast enough.
